SI on Kyrie

This is a great SI story on Kyrie. Seriously, how much do you love this guy? And how much does it still hurt that we didn't get a full season out of him? Oh, what could have been.

I got a chance to go to MSG on Wednesday night to see him in person against the Knicks. It is still remarkable to me how quick he is and how well he can break down a defense. He is also among the best I've ever seen at finishing with his left hand (I wish Rivers was 1/10th as good using his left hand near the basket) . He's almost better going to his left because the defense isn't as accustomed to stopping it. I'd argue that the only right hand player I've seen with a better ability to finish with his left hand is Larry Bird.

Interestingly, in the Knicks game I was extremely impressed with his ability to run the pick and roll and perfectly time passes to his teammates. He lost 3 or 4 assists because his teammates couldn't finish perfect passes. I say "interestingly" because that same day I was reading an analysis of Rubio and Irving and their ability to run the pick and roll. The analysis showed that they were nearly equally effective, but their effectiveness was a result of different approaches: namely Kyrie as a scorer off the pick and Rubio as a passer. From what I saw on Wednesday, Kyrie has the intuitive ability to pass out of the pick and roll, but might choose to shoot more because his teammates aren't as good at finishing as Rubio's teammates in Minny.